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Accessions  No.^^^^,  QJSS  M>. 


THE 


NEW   TENDENCIES 


OF 


POLITICAL  ECONOMY, 


BY 


EMILE  DE  LAVELEYE, 

It 

Professor  of  Political  Economy  at  the  University  of  Lu^e,   Belgium. 


TRANSLATED  FROM  THE   "REVUE  DES  DEUX  MONDES  " 
FOR  THE   "BANKER'S  MAGAZINE," 


BY 


GEORGE    WALKER: 


APPENDIX    CONTAINING    THE     REMARKS    OF    M.    DE    LAVELEYE    AT 
THE    ADAM    SMITH    CENTENARY    IN    LONDON. 


THE   BANKER'S   MAGAZINE*"AND  "STATISTICAL   REGISTER, 

No.    2S1     Broadway,    New    York. 
I879. 


TRANSLATOR'S    PREFACE. 

The  recent  publication  of  an  American  translation  of  Roscher's  Principles  of 
Political  Economy  reminded  me  of  Professor  de  Laveleye's  very  instructive  article  on 
the  New  Tendencies  of  Political  Economy  and  of  Socialism,  which  appeared  in  the 
Revue  des  Deux  Mondes,  of  July  15,  1876.  I  had  often  thought  of  publishing  a 
translation  of  this  article,  but  the  time  did  not  seem  to  me  to  have  arrived  for 
awakening  a  proper  interest  in  the  subject  in  this  country.  The  course  which  public 
discussions  have  taken  within  the  last  year,  however,  and  notably  the  resumption  of 
specie  payments,  have  brought  financial  and  economical  questions  to  the  front,  and 
give  promise  of  a  more  intelligent  consideration  of  them  than  at  any  recent  period. 
Coincident  with  this  is  the  revival  of  the  protectionist  and  free-trade  war  in  Europe, 
a  war  which  has  been  actively  begun  in  Germany,  Austria,  France  and  Italy,  and 
the  mutterings  of  which  have  not  been  unheard  even  in  Great  Britain.  The  dis- 
tressed condition  of  trade  in  all  of  these  countries  and  the  new  political  systems 
which  are  being  consolidated  in  Germany,  France,  and  Italy,  have  made  the  discus- 
sion of  economic  principles  and  of  systems  of  fiscal  administration  more  general  and 
more  vital  than  perhaps  ever  before.  Indissolubly  mixed  up  with  them  is  the  social 
question  in  its  various  aspects.  As  M.  de  Laveleye  justly  observes,  in  both  of  the 
papers  now  first  offered  to  American  readers,  political  economy  seems  to  have  passed 
through  its  first  stage — that  which  gives  instruction  as  to  the  accumulation  of 
national  wealth — and  to  have  reached  the  far  more  important  question  of  its  distri- 
bution among  the  several  classes  which  participate  in  creating  it.  The  respective 
claims  of  capital  and  labor  present  to-day  the  most  difficult  and  anxious  social  prob- 
lem. Political  economy  concerns  itself  with  this  problem,  both  because  it  calls  in 
question  the  soundness  of  its  past  conclusions  respecting  the  creation  of  wealth,  and 
because  it  lies  at  the  very  bottom  of  its  future  conclusions  as  to  an  equitable  distri- 
bution. 

The  "orthodox"  political  economy,  as  it  is  styled  by  M.  de  Laveleye,  means  the 
doctrines  of  the  Manchester  school  of  free  traders,  as  generally  held  in  England  for 
the  last  quarter  of  a  century  ;  doctrines  which  are  as  firmly  established  at  Oxford 
and  Cambridge  and  in  the  House  of  Commons,  as  in  Yorkshire  or  Lancashire. 
There  have  been  some  dissenters,  however,  like  Cliffe  Leslie  and  Thornton,  who 
have  called  down  the  scoffings,  if  not  the  anathemas,  of  the  orthodox  camp.  Thus, 
Professor  Rogers  says,  in  his  article  in  the  January  Princeton,  "It  is  probable  that 
there  is  no  subject  on  which  English  people  are  practically  more  united  than  on 
this,  for  they  do  not  trouble  themselves  to  argue  with  a  few  people  who  are  trying 
to  raise  an  exploded  practice  under  the  new  name  of  reciprocity.  They  are  very 
tolerant  of  what  they  think  is  folly,  but  do  not  think  it  strong  enough  to  be  mis- 
chievous." This  is  very  likely,  but  when  we  find  such  men  as  Leonard  Courtney 
boldly  advocating  an  export  duty  on  coal,  or  the  still  more  stringent  measure  of  a 
duty  at  the  pit's  mouth,  "the  intention  and  justification"  of  which  would  be  "to 
put  all  English  industries  under  restraint,"  to  put  "  a  drag  on  industrial  progress," 
because  it  would  be  a  drag  on  the  "multiplication  of  the  population,"  and  "that 
the  dangerous  expansion  of  national  industry  should  be  kept  under,"  we  begin  to 
suspect  that  all  is  not  harmony  in  the  free-trade  camp. 

The  dogmatism  of  the  Manchester  school  met,  also,  with  a  sharp  rebuff  in  the 
address  delivered  by  Professor  Ingram,  of  Edinburgh,  before  the  British  Association 
at  its  last  annual  meeting.  Professor  Bonamy  Price,  of  Oxford,  followed  in  the 
same  vein  in  his  paper  read  before  the  Social  Science  Association  at  a  still  later 


IV  TRANSLATOR  S    PREFACE. 

date.  Both  these  economists  are,  we  believe,  free  traders ;  but  they  warn  English 
men  that  the  conclusions  of  economic  science  are  always  subject  to  be  reconsidered, 
perhaps  to  be  reversed.  If  this  dangerous  heresy  should  gain  ground  what  becomes 
of  the  doctrine  of  "  natural  laws,"  to  which  man  is  supposed  to  be  inexorably 
bound  as  the  planets  to  the  solar  system  ? 

The  papers  now  translated  do  not  present  an  issue  against  free  trade.  On  the 
contrary,  Professor  de  Laveleye  is  a  free  trader,  and  Belgium  is  the  most  advanced 
of  all  free-trade  countries.  But  his  economic  and  social  philosophy  is  utterly  at 
variance  with  those  of  the  Manchester  school.  Nothing  could  be  wider  apart  than 
Robert  Lowe  and  M.  de  Laveleye.  One  believes  that  man  is  an  atom  in  the  great 
family  of  mankind,  too  obscure  and  unimportant  to  be  taken  into  the  account  in 
settling  the  question  of  the  well-being  of  the  race.  The  other  holds  that  man  is 
not  a  mere  money-getting  machine,  nor  is  the  selfish  gratification  of  his  appetites 
his  moving  impulse.  That  he  is,  on  the  contrary,  "a  moral  being,  who  recognizes 
the  obligations  of  duty,  and  under  the  teachings  of  religion  or  of  philosophy,  often 
sacrifices  his  enjoyments,  his  well-being,  or  his  life  even,  to  his  country,  to  human- 
ity, to  truth,  to  God.  In  different  countries,  at  different  epochs,  men  obey  different 
motives,  because  they  have  formed  peculiar  conceptions  of  well-being,  of  law,  of 
morality,  and  of  justice." 

The  doctrines  of  the  historical  school  in  political  economy  lead  to  no  partisanship 
whatever.  They  are  held  equally  by  free  traders  and  by  protectionists  in  Europe. 
The  underlying  motive  of  their  system  is  the  right  of  individual  and  of  national  judg- 
ment to  determine  upon"  a  given  state  of  facts,  what  policy,  in  respect  of  production 
and  exchange,  it  is  wise  to  pursue  here  and  now.  It  treats  political  economy  as  a 
science,  not  of  pure  principles,  but  of  applied  principles,  and  this  alone  makes  pos- 
sible a  progressive  fiscal  policy,  moulding  itself  according  to  the  traditions,  the 
usages,  the  aspirations,  and  the  actual  condition  of  a  free  people.  This  is  eminently 
the  economic  system  suited  to  the  wants  of  the  American  people.  It  deals  with  the 
past  without  contumely,  and  it  welcomes  the  future  without  prejudice. 

No  man  who  looks  at  the  history  of  past  American  legislation  on  the  subject  of 
the  tariff,  in  a  calm  and  philosophic  spirit,  can  fail  to  admit  that  it  is  full  of 
ignprance,  of  vacillation  and  of  mistakes.  We  might  have  been  abreast  of  England 
in  opening  our  markets  freely  to  the  world,  if  our  tariff  policy  had  been  consistent 
and  progressive.  If  the  English  House  of  Commons  has  legislated  for  mankind 
rather  than  for  man,  the  American  Congress  has  legislated  for  man  rather  than  for 
mankind.  In  other  words,  the  Committee  of  Ways  and  Means  has  always  been  the 
center  of  personal  and  individual  and  local  interests,  instead  of  consulting  and  rep- 
resenting the  average  interests  of  American  citizens — occupying  a  great  continent 
with  different  productions  and  different  wants.  I  do  not  say  that  the  harmonizing 
of  those  interests  is  not  at  all  times  difficult,  but  it  does  seem  to  me  that  if  the 
fiscal  policy  of  the  country  were  put  beyond  the  pale  of  party,  as  completely  as  has 
been  done  in  Great  Britain  since  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws,  a  system  might  be 
eliminated  which  should  respect  traditions,  conciliate  labor  and  make  rapid  strides 
in  the  direction  of  commercial  freedom.  In  this  as  in  most  public  questions  the 
truth  lies  between  the  extremes — "Media  tutissimus  ibis" 

GEORGE  WALKER. 


UlTiyBESITT 


THE    NEW  TENDENCIES  OF   POLITICAL   ECONOMY.* 

[  TRANSLATED    FROM    THE    REVUE    DBS    DEUX    MONDES   BY   GEORGE  WALKER.] 

The  Political  Economy  which  I  should  describe  as  ortho- 
dox, that  is  to  say,  the  science  as  it  had  been  understood 
and  expounded  by  its  fathers,  Adam  Smith  and  J.  B.  Say, 
and  by  their  disciples,  has  seemed  to  be  definitively  settled. 
Like  the  Church  of  Rome,  it  had  its  credo.  Certain 
truths  appeared  to  be  so  firmly  established,  so  irrefragably 
demonstrated,  that  they  were  accepted  as  dogmas.  Those 
who  doubted  them  were  regarded  as  heretics,  whose  igno- 
rance alone  explained  their  vagaries.  No  doubt  these  truths 
had  not  been  formulated  without  meeting  with  vigorous 
opposition.  From  the  beginning,  and  down  to  our  own  time, 
they  have  been  attacked  by  certain  religious  writers,  who  have 
charged  them  with  materialism  and  immorality,  and  by  dif- 
ferent socialistic  sects,  who  have  reproached  them  with  sacrific- 
ing relentlessly  the  rights  of  the  disinherited  classes  to  the 
privileges  of  the  rich  ;  but  the  economists  have  had  little  diffi- 
culty in  defending  themselves  against  these  classes  of  adver- 
saries, who  have  been  governed  chiefly  by  sentiment,  and 
have  had  no  just  apprehension  of  the  questions  which  they 
ventured  to  discuss. 

At  the  present  day,  however,  the  dogmas  of  political  econ- 
omy are  meeting  with  far  more  formidable  antagonists.  In 
Germany  they  are  found  among  the  professors  of  political 
economy  themselves,  who,  for  this  reason,  have  been  denomi- 
nated Katheder  Socialisten,  or,  "  Socialists  of  the  chair."  In 
England  they  are  those  economists  who  have  given  the  most 
attention  to  the  study  of  history  and  of  law,  and  who  best 
understand  the  facts  established  by  observation  and  by  statis- 
tics ;  such  as  Mr.  Cliffe  Leslie,  and  Mr.  Thornton  ;  in  Italy 
they  constitute  a  whole  group  of  distinguished  writers, 
Luzzati,  Forti,  Lampertico,  Cusmano,  A.  Morelli,  who  have 
given  expression  to  their  ideas  in  a  Congress  assembled 
last  year  at  Milan,  and  who  have  for  their  organ  the 
"  Giornale  degli  Economisti"  In  Denmark  there  is  the 
excellent  economical  repertory  published  by  Messrs.  Fred- 
ericksen,  V.  Falbe,  Hansen,  and  Wil.  Scharling.  It  can- 
not be  doubted,  therefore,  that  there  is,  in  the  present 
instance,  a  scientific  revolution  going  on  of  a  very  serious 
character,  which  calls  for  an  attentive  examination.  We  shall 
endeavor  first,  to  point  out  the  origin  and  character  of  these 
new  tendencies  of  political  economy  ;  and  afterwards,  to  con- 

*Les   Tendences    nouvelles    de  L' Economie    Politique  et  du  Socialisme.     Revue  des  Deux 
Mondes.\~]\\\y,  1875.1  By  EMILE  DE  LAVELEYE. 


2  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

sider  carefully  the  writings  of  some  of  the  authors  who 
best  represent  the  different  shades  of  the  movement,  as  well 
as  those  of  the  Socialists  whom  it  is  their  mission  to  combat. 

I. 

The  new  political  economy  takes  a  different  view  from  the 
old,  of  the  fundamental  principles,  the  methods,  the  mission, 
and  the  conclusions  of  the  science.  The  starting  point  of  the 
Socialists  of  the  chair,  is  entirely  different  from  that  of  the 
orthodox  economists,  whom  they  designate  under  the  name  of 
Manchester-thum,  or  sect  of  Manchester ;  because  it  is,  in 
fact,  the  school  of  the  free  traders,  which  has  expounded 
most  logically,  the  dogmas  of  the  ancient  credo.  Let  us  see 
how  the  new  economists  themselves  indicate  the  points  which 
separate  them  from  the  generally  received  doctrines.* 

Adam  Smith,  and  more  especially,  his  successors,  such  as 
Ricardo,  McCulloch,  J.  B.  Say,  and  all  the  so-called  English 
school,  followed  the  deductive  method.  They  started  out  with 
certain  ideas  respecting  man  and  nature,  and  thence  deduced 
certain  consequences.  Rossi  characterizes  this  method  clearly 
when  he  says  that  "  political  economy,  regarded  from  a  general 
stand-point,  is  rather  a  science  of  reason  than  of  observation. 
It  has  for  its  object  a  thorough  knowledge  of  the  relations 
which  proceed  from  the  nature  of  things.  ...  It  seeks 
for  laws,  by  taking  •  its  stand  on  the  general  and  constant 
facts  of  human  nature."  In  this  system,  man  is  considered 
as  a  being  who  everywhere  and  always  pursues  his  private 
interest  ;  under  the  impulse  of  this  motive,  good  in  itself 
( since  it  is  the  principle  of  his  preservation  ),  he  searches 
after  that  which  is  useful  to  him,  and  no  one  is  able  to  dis- 
cover it  better  than  himself.  If,  therefore,  he  is  free  to  act 
as  he  pleases,  he  will,  in  the  end,  procure  for  himself  all  the 
satisfactions  which  it  is  given  to  him  to  attain.  Down  to  the 
present  time,  the  State  has  always  put  restraints  upon  the  full 
expansion  of  economic  forces  ;  do  away  with  these  restraints 
and  as  all  men  will  apply  themselves  freely  to  the 
pursuit  of  their  well-being,  the  true  order  will  establish  itself 
in  the  universe.  Competition,  general  and  unrestricted 
enables  every  individual  to  reach  the  place  which  is  best 
suited  to  him,  and  to  reap  the  just  reward  of  his  labors.  As 
Montesquieu  has  observed,  "  it  is  competition  which  puts  a 
just  price  on  merchandise."  It  is  the  infallible  regulator  of 
the  industrial  world.  It  is  like  a  providential  law,  which,  in 
the  highly  complicated  relations  of  mankind  united  by  the 
bonds  of  society,  causes  order  and  justice  to  be  enthroned.  If 
the  State  will  only  abstain  from  all  interference  with  human 
transactions,  and  accord  entire  freedom  to  property,  to  capi- 
tal, to  labor,  to  exchanges,  to  vocations,  the  production  of 

*  We  shall  follow  in  this  connection  principally  the  writings  of  Adolph  Held,  Gustav  Schon- 
berg,  Gustav  Schmoller,  Contzen,  Wagner,  and  L.  Luzzati. 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  3 

wealth  will  be   carried    to    its   highest   point,  and  the   general 
well-being  will  thus  become  as   great  ,as  possible.     The   legis-  ^ 
lator  has  no  occasion  to   occupy  himself  with  tne  distribution 
of  wealth  ;  it  will  be  made  conformably  to  natural  laws  and  to 
contracts  freely  entered  into. 

A  phrase  of  Gournay,  enunciated  in  the  last  century, 
embodies  the  whole  doctrine :  laissez  faire,  laissez  passer. 
Under  this  theory,  the  problems  which  have  relation  to  the 
government  of  societies,  were  found  to  be  greatly  simplified. 
The  statesman  has  only  to  fold  his  arms.  The  world  goes 
on  of  itself  towards  its  end.  It  is  [the  optimism  of  Leibniz, 
and  of  HegeQtransferred  to  the  domain  of  politics. 

[Resting  on  these  philosophic  doctrines,  the  economists  4 
enunciated  certain  general  principles  applicable  in  all  times, 
and  to  all  peoples,  because  of  their  absolute  verity]]  The 
orthodox  political  economy  was  essentially  cosmopolitan.  It 
took  no  account  of  the  division  of  mankind  into  separate 
nations  ;  nor  of  the  different  interests  which  might  result  there- 
from any  more  than  it  concerned  itself  with  the  necessities,  or 
the  particular  conditions  resulting  from  the  history  of  differ- 
ent  States.  Qt  regarded  only  the  good  of  mankind  considered 
as  a  single  great  familyj]  precisely  as  does  every  abstract 
science,  and  every  universal  religion,  Christianity  most  of  all. 

Having  thus  set  forth  the  old  doctrine,  the  new  economists 
proceed  to  criticise  it  as  follows  :  They  accuse  it  of  seeing 
things  from  only  one  side.  They  admit  that  man  pursues  his 
own  interest,  but  they  assert  that  more  than  one  motive  acts 
upon  his  moral  nature,  and  regulates  his  conduct.  Apart  from 
self-interest,  there  is  the  sentiment  of  collectivity,  the  gemein 
si'nn,  the  social  instinct,  which  manifests  itself  in  the  forma- 
tion of  the  family,  of  the  community,  and  of  the  State.  Man 
is  not  like  the  lower  animals,  which  know  nothing  beyond 
the  satisfaction  of  their  appetites  ;  he  is  a  moral  being,  who 
recognizes  the  obligations  of  duty,  and  under  the  teachings 
of  religion  or  of  philosophy,  often  sacrifices  his  enjoyments, 
his  well-being,  and  his  life  even,  to  his  country,  to  humanity, 
to  truth,  to  God.  It  is  a  mistake,  therefore,  to  predicate  a 
series  of  deductions  upon  the  aphorism  that  man  acts  onlyv. 
under  the  control  of  a  single  motive — individual  interest/' 
Those  "  general  and  constant  facts  of  human  nature,"  from 
which  Rossi  would  have  us  deduce  economic  laws,  are  only 
a  conception  of  the  imagination.  In  different  countries,  at 
different  epochs,  men  obey  different  motives,  because  they 
have  formed  peculiar  conceptions  of  well-being,  of  law,  of 
morality,  and  of  justice.  The  savage  procures  his  subsistence 
by  chasing  and  if  need  be,  devouring,  those  of  his  own  kind  : 
the  citizen  of  antiquity  by  reducing  them  to  slavery,  in  order 
to  live  on  the  fruits  of  their  labor  ;  the  man  of  modern  times 
by  paying  them  wages. 
LMankind  having,  according  to  their  several  conditions  of  y 


4  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

civilization,  different  wants,  different  motives,  different  methods 
of  producing,  of  distributing,  and  of  consuming  wealth,  it 
'  follows  thence  that  economic  problems  do  not  admit  of  those 
general  and  a  priori  solutions,  which  are  usually  demanded  of 
the  science,  and  which  it  has  too  often  ventured  to  supply.  We 
ought  always  to  examine  the  question  relatively  to  a  given 
country,  and  in  so  doing  to  seek  the  aid  of  statistics 
and  of  history.  Hence  arises  the  historical  or  Realistic  method, 
as  it  is  denominated  by  the  Socialists  of  the  chair,  that  is 
to  say,  the  method  founded  on  facts.^]] 

According  to  the  Socialists  of  the  chair,  it  is  also  a  mis- 
take to  maintain,  as  Bastiat  has  done  in  his  Harmonies  Econo- 
miqueS)  that  general  order  results  from  the  free  play  of  indi- 
vidual selfishness,  and  that  consequently  it  is  only  necessary 
to  remove  all  hindrances  in  order  that  each  person  shall 
attain  to  the  well-being  to  which  his  efforts  entitle  him. 
But  selfishness  leads  men  to  wickedness  and  to  spoliation  ;  it 
is  necessary,  therefore,  to  restrain  it  and  not  to  give  it  free 
play  ;  this  is,  in  the  first  place,  the  proper  mission  of  moral- 
ity, and  afterwards,  the  mission  of  the  State,  as  the  organ 
of  justice.  Without  doubt,  if  men  were  perfect  and  desired 
only  good,  liberty  would  suffice  to  insure  the  reign  of  order; 
but  constituted  as  they  are,  unrestrained  interests  result  in 
antagonism,  and  not  in  harmony.  The  employer  desires  to 
reduce  wages,  the  workman  to  raise  them.  The  landowner 
is  constantly  endeavoring  to  advance  rent,  the  farmer  to 
reduce  it.  Everywhere  the  strongest  and  the  most  capable 
triumphs,  and  in  the  conflict  of  opposing  interests,  no  one 
troubles  himself  about  the  teachings  of  morality  or  of  justice. 

It  is  in  England,  especially,  where  all  restraints  have  been 
abolished,  and  where  the  most  perfect  freedom  of  industry 
prevails,  that  the  war  of  classes,  the  antagonism  of  masters 
and  workmen  presents  itself  in  the  most  determined  way,  and 
under  aspects  the  most  alarming.  It  is  in  that  country,  also, 
— the  country,  par  excellence,  of  laissez  faire — that,  for  a  con- 
siderable time  past,  the  interference  of  Government  has  been 
most  frequently  invoked,  to  repress  the  abuses  of  the  strong 
and  to  protect  the  weak.  After  having  disarmed  power, 
*they  are  daily  conferring  upon  it  new  privileges.  Is  not  this 
a  proof  that  the  economic  doctrine  of  absolute  freedom 
does  not  afford  a  complete  solution  of  the  questions  at 
issue  ? 

The  new  economists  do  not  profess  that  horror  of  the 
State  which  led  their  predecessors  to  declare  sometimes 
that  the  State  was  a  canker  and  sometimes  that  it  was  a 
necessary  evil.  To  them,  on  the  contrary,  the  State,  which 

*  Although  in  France  no  new  economic  school  has  been  established,  as  in  Germany,  in  Eng- 
land and  in  Italy,  many  writers  are  pursuing  the  historical  or  realistic  method  with  a  confi- 
dence of  learning  and  a  richness  of  information  which  are  nowhere  else  surpassed.  It  will 
suffice  us  to  mention  MM.  Leonce  de  Lavergne,  L.  Reybaud,  Wolowski,  Victor  Bonnet,  and 
Paul  Leroy-Beaulieu. 


NEW    TENDENCIES   OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  5 

represents  the  unity  of  the  nation,  is  the  supreme  organ  of 
law  and  the  instrument  of  justice.  Being  itself  the  emana- 
tion of  the  vital  forces  and  of  the  intellectual  aspirations  of 
a  country,  it  is  charged  with  the  duty  of  fostering  the  devel- 
opment of  these  in  all  directions.  As  history  proves,  it  is 
the  most  powerful  agent  of  civilization  and  of  progress. 
The  liberty  of  the  individual  ought  to  be  respected  and 
even  stimulated,  but  it  should  remain  in  subjection  to  the 
rules  of  morality  and  of  justice,  and  those  rules,  which 
become  more  and  'more  strict  in  proportion  as  the  ideas  of 
goodness  and  justice  become  more  pure,  should  be  made 
obligatory  by  the  State. 

Freedom  of  industry  is,  doubtless,  an  excellent  thing.  Free 
exchange,  freedom  of  labor  and  of  contracts  have  contrib- 
uted very  greatly  to  increase  the  production  of  wealth.  It 
is  necessary,  therefore,  to  strike  off  from  liberty  all  fetters, 
if  any  still  exist ;  but  it  is  the  duty  of  the  State  to  inter- 
pose whenever  the  evidences  of  individual  interest  appear 
to  conflict  with  the  humane  mission  of  political  economy, 
by  the  oppression  and  degradation  of  the  lower  classes. 
Thus  it  is,  that  the  State  has  a  double  duty  to  perform  : 
first,  to  maintain  liberty  in  the  limits  marked  out  for  it  by 
morality  and  law  ;  next,  to  lend  its  support  in  every  case 
where  the  object  in  view  (which  is  social  progress)  can  be 
better  attained  in  this  way  than  by  individual  effort.  Cases 
in  point  are  the  improvement  of  harbors,  the  opening  of 
ways  of  communication,  the  fostering  of  education,  of  the 
sciences,  of  the  arts,  or  of  any  other  object  of  general  utility. 
The  interference  of  the  State  ought  not  always  to  be  withheld, 
as  the  economists  d  outrance  desire,  nor  always  invoked,  as 
the  Socialists,  on  the  other  hand,  demand  ;  each  case  should 
be  examined  by  itself,  taking  into  account  the  wants  to  be 
satisfied  and  the  ability  of  private  enterprise  to  meet  them. 
But  it  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  duty  of  the 
State  grows  less  important  as  civilization  advances;  that  duty 
is  by  no  means  the  same  at  the  present  day  as  under  the 
patriarchal  or  despotic  systems  of  government.  The  functions 
of  the  State  are  constantly  growing  larger  wherever  new 
paths  are  opened  to  human  activity  and  in  proportion  as  the 
appreciation  of  what  is  lawful  and  of  what  is  unlawful 
grows  purer.  The  same  doctrine  has  been  also  propounded 
in  France,  with  much  force,  by  M.  Dupont-White  in  his  book 
on  the  Individual  and  the  State. 

The  Socialists  of  the  chair  also  accuse  the  orthodox  econ- 
omists of  being  too  exclusively  occupied  with  questions  relat- 
ing to  the  production  of  wealth,  and  with  neglecting  those 
which  concern  its  distribution  and  consumption.  They  allege 
that  the  economists  have  treated  man  merely  as  a  producing 
agent,  without  giving  due  consideration  to  his  destiny  and 
his  obligations  as  a  moral  and  intelligent  being.  In  their 


6  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

view,  owing  to  the  marvelous  results  of  science  applied  to 
industry,  the  latter  might  even  now  furnish  a  sufficiency  of 
products,  if  all  the  labor  were  usefully  employed  and  if  so 
many  human  efforts  were  not  frittered  away  in  the  procur- 
ing of  false,  if  not  vicious,  indulgences. 

The  great  problem  of  our  times  is  what  is  called  the  social 
question  ;  that  is  to  say,  the  question  of  distribution.  The 
working  classes  seek  to  better  their  condition  and  to  obtain 
a  laager  share  of  the  goods  which  are  produced  by  the  joint 
action  of  capital  and  labor.  Within  what  limits  and  under 
what  conditions  is  this  possible?  This  is  the  question.  In 
presence  of  the  dangers  which  disturb  and  threaten  the 
social  body,  three  systems  present  themselves  :  that  which 
advocates  a  return  to  the  past,  and  the  reestablishment  of 
the  old  order  of  things — socialism,  which  looks  to  a  radical 
change  in  the  social  order — and  finally,  the  orthodox  politi- 
cal economy,  which  holds  that  everything  will  find  its  solu- 
tion in  liberty  and  in  the  action  of  natural  laws.  According 
to  the  Socialists  of  the  chair,  no  one  of  these  three  systems 
is  capable  of  solving  all  the  difficulties  which  agitate  our 
times.  A  return  to  the  past  is  impossible ;  a  general  and 
hasty  remodeling  of  society  is  no  less  so  ;  and  to  invoke  the 
action  of  liberty  is  only  a  mockery  of  words,  since  the  ques- 
tion at  issue  is  one  of  law,  of  the  civil  code,  and  of  social 
organization.  The  distribution  of  products  is  made  not  only 
in  virtue  of  contracts,  which  ought  evidently  to  be  free,  but 
still  more  in  accordance  with  civil  laws  and  with  moral  senti- 
ments, the  influence  of  which  must  be  understood  and  the 
justice  of  which  must  be  determined.  Economic  problems 
cannot  be  justly  considered  apart  from  other  things  ;  they  are 
allied  intimately  with  psychology,  with  religion,  with  morality, 
with  law,  with  customs,  with  history.  Account  should,  there- 
fore, be  taken  of  all  these  elements,  and  we  should  not  rest- 
contented  with  the  uniform  and  superficial  formula  of  laissez 
faire.  The  antagonism  of  classes,  which  has  always  been  at 
the  bottom  of  political  revolutions,  is  reappearing  at  the 
present  day  with  aspects  more  formidable  than  ever  before. 
It  seems  to  put  in  peril  the  future  of  civilization.  We  can- 
not deny  the  evil  ;  but  it  becomes  us,  rather,  to  study  it  in 
all  its  phases,  and  to  endeavor  to  find  a  remedy  for  it  in 
progressive  and  rational  reforms.  The  sources  of  inspiration 
must  be  sought  in  morality,  in  the  sentiment  of  justice,  and 
in  Christian  charity. 

In  short,  the  elder  economists,  starting  from  certain  abstract 
principles,  endeavored,  by  the  deductive  method,  to  arrive  at 
conclusions  well  settled  and  universally  applicable.  The 
Socialists  of  the  chair,  on  the  other  hand,  taking  as  their 
basis  a  knowledge  of  past  and  present  facts,  draw  from  them, 
by  the  inductive  and  historical  method,  certain  conclusions 
which  are  only  relatively  true  and  are  modified  by  the  state 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  7 

of  society  to  which  they  are  applied.  The  one  party  con- 
siders that  the  natural  order,  which  presides  over  physical 
phenomena,  ought  also  to  govern  human  societies,  and  main- 
tain that,  if  all  artificial  fetters  were  removed,  there  would 
result  from  the  free  play  of  inclinations  a  harmony  of  inter- 
ests, and  from  the  complete  enfranchisement  of  individuals 
a  better  social  organization  and  a  greater  measure  of  gen- 
eral well-being.  The  other  party,  on  the  contrary,  maintains 
that  the  same  law  holds  good  in  the  domain  of  human 
economy  which  prevails  among  animals,  namely,  that  in  the 
struggle  for  existence  and  the  conflict  of  selfishness,  the 
strong  are  -certain  to  crush  out,  or  at  least  to  take  advantage 
of,  the  weak,  unless  the  State,  which  is  the  organ  of  justice, 
comes  in  to  award  to  each  one  the  return  to  which  he  is 
legitimately  entitled.  They  also  hold  that  the  State  ought 
to  contribute  directly  to  the  progress  of  civilization.  So  far, 
in  short,  from  admitting,  with  the  orthodox  economists,  that 
uncontrolled  liberty  is  sufficient  to  put  an  end  to  social  con- 
flicts, they  maintain  that  progressive  reforms  and  ameliora- 
tions, inspired  by  sentiments  of  justice,  are  indispensable  to 
society,  if  it  hopes  to  escape  civil  discord  and  the  despotism 
which  is  certain  to  follow  in  its  train. 

The  new  school  of  economists  has  made  the  greatest 
progress  in  Germany,  the  reason  being  that  political  economy 
is  there  ranked  among  the  departmental  sciences,  {sciences 
camerales}  that  is  to  say,  sciences  which  pertain  to  Govern- 
ment. They  have  never,  therefore,  treated  it  as  an  independ- 
ent subject  governed  by  special  laws.  Even  the  orthodox 
disciples  of  the  English  school,  like  Rau,  have  never  failed  to 
recognize  the  close  bonds  which  unite  it  with  other  social 
sciences,  notably  with  politics ;  and  they  have  habitually 
resorted  to  facts  in  support  of  their  positions.  Ever  since 
the  principles  of  Adam  Smith  and  his  followers  began  to 
take  root  in  Germany,  they  have  met  with  objectors  like 
Professor  Lueder  and  Count  von  Soden,  who  maintained  that 
the  increase  of  wealth  was  not  the  only  thing  to  be  consid- 
ered, but  the  general  progress  of  civilization.  Subsequently 
to  these  authors  have  arisen  List,  Stein,  Roscher,  Knies,  Hil- 
ebrand,  and  at  the  present  day  their  name  is  legion  :  Nasse, 
Schmoller,  Held,  Contzen,  SchafBe,  Wagner,  Schonberg,  G. 
Hirth,  V.  Bohmert,  Brentano,  Cohn,  Von  Scheel,  Samter. 

II. 

Let  us  now  endeavor  to  sift  out  what  there  is  of  good  in 
the  views  of  the  new  school.  In  the  first  place,  it  is  clear 
that  we  have  not  yet  arrived  at  the  point  of  determining 
accurately  the  fundamental  principle,  the  characteristics  and 
the  limitations  of  political  economy,  nor  its  relations  to  other 
sciences  of  the  same  order.  "  Though  we  may  blush  for  the 
science,"  said  M.  Rossi,  "the  economist  must,  nevertheless, 


8  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

avow,  that  the  first  question  to  be  examined  is  still  this  : 
What  is  political  economy,  what  are  its  objects,  its  extent, 
its  limitations  ? "  This  observation  is  well  founded  ;  even  in 
the  Dictionaire  ^Economic  Politique,  the  writer  on  whom 
devolved  the  duty  of  exactly  defining  it,  M.  C.  Coquelin,  is 
unable  to  decide  whether  it  is  an  art  or  a  science.  He  desires 
to  establish  it  as  a  science,  defining  it  with  Destutt  de 
Tracy,  as  the  resultant  of  truths  which  come  from  the  exam- 
ination of  a  given  subject.  He  adopts  the  language  of 
Rossi,  that  "  science  has  no  object :  the  moment  we  begin 
to  consider  the  uses  which  can  be  made  of  it,  we  fall  from 
science  into  art.  Science  is  in  all  things  only  the  possession 
of  truth."  And  M.  Coquelin  adds,  "  To  observe  and  describe 
actual  phenomena,  that  is  science ;  it  neither  counsels,  nor 
prescribes,  nor  directs."  Nevertheless,  after  having  settled 
upon  this  definition,  the  embarrassment  of  M.  Coquelin  is 
great,  and  he  avows  it  frankly.  The  very  dictionary  in  which 
he  wrote  contains  a  variety  of  articles,  and  those  among  the 
most  important,  which  do  not  content  themselves  with 
observing  and  describing,  but  on  the  contrary,  counsel  and 
prescribe  ;  which  condemn  this  institution  or  that  law,  and 
demand  its  repeal. 

According  to  these  articles,  political  economy  would  seem 
to  be  only  an  art,  and  not  a  science.  M.  Coquelin  admits 
that  it  is,  at  the  same  time,  both  the  one  or  the  other  ;  but 
when  he  tries  to  draw  the  line  of  demarcation,  he  is  forced 
to  make  this  singular  confession  of  impotence  :  "  Shall  we 
endeavor,  at  present,  to  make  a  clear  separation  between  the 
science  and  the  art  by  bestowing  on  them  different  names  ? 
No,  it  is  enough  for  us  to  note  the  distinction;  time  and  a 
better  understanding  of  the  subject  will  do  the  rest." 

The  uncertainty  and  the  obscurity  which  we  find  in  most 
authors  when  they  endeavor  to  define  the  objects  of  political 
economy,  may  perhaps  arise  from  their  endeavor  to  make  it 
either  a  science  of  observation,  like  natural  history,  or  an 
exact  science,  like  mathematics,  and  because  they  have 
assumed  to  find  in  it  fixed  and  immutable  laws,  like  those 
which  govern  the  physical  universe.  Let  us  endeavor  to  clear 
up  these  two  points,  inasmuch  as  they  are  fundamental  ;  the 
true  character  of  political  economy  will  be  made  plainer  by 
the  discussion. 

Three  classes  of  sciences  are  generally  recognized  to  exist, 
the  exact  sciences,  the  natural  sciences,  and  the  moral  and 
political  sciences.  The  exact  sciences  are  so  termed  because 
they  have  to  do  with  clearly  defined  abstract  data,  such  as 
numbers,  lines,  points  and  geometrical  figures,  and  by  a  process 
of  reasoning  arrive  at  conclusions  which  are  rigorously  exact 
and  unassailable  ;  such  are  the  sciences  of  arithmetic,  algebra, 
and  geometry.  The  natural  sciences  observe  and  describe  the 
phenomena  of  nature,  and  seek  to  discover  the  laws  which 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  9 

govern  them  ;  such  are  the  sciences  of  astronomy, 
physics,  botany,  and  physiology.  The  moral  and  political 
sciences  deal  with  ideas,  with  the  actions  of  man  and  the 
creations  of  his  will — with  institutions,  laws,  and  religion  ; 
such  are  the  sciences  of  philosophy,  morality,  law,  and 
politics.  In  which  of  these  categories  shall  we  rank  political 
economy  ? 

Certain  writers,  among  whom  are  M.  Du  Mesail-Marigny, 
in  France,  M.  Walras,  in  Switzerland,  and  Mr.  Jevons,  in 
England,  have  endeavored  to  resolve  some  of  the  problems 
of  political  economy  by  putting  them  into  algebraic  formu- 
las.* It  does  not  seem  to  me  that  they  have,  in  this  way, 
thrown  much  light  on  the  difficult  points  to  which  they  have 
applied  this  method  of  demonstration.  Economic  phenomena 
are  subject  to  a  great  variety  of  diverse  and  variable  influ- 
ences which  are  not  capable  of  being  represented  by  figures  ; 
they  do  not  admit,  therefore,  of  those  rigorous  deductions 
which  belong  to  mathematics.  The  facts  which  have  to  be 
considered,  the  wants  of  mankind,  the  value  of  commodities, 
wealth,  have  in  them  nothing  absolutely  fixed,  and  the  diver- 
sities in  them  depend  on  opinion,  fashion,  custom,  climate, 
and  an  infinity  of  circumstances  which  it  is  impossible  to 
embrace  in  an  algebraic  equation. 

Political  economy  cannot,  therefore,  be  ranked  among  the 
exact  sciences.  This  has  been  one  of  the  grounds  of  com- 
plaint against  it,  and  it  has  even  been  denied  the  name  of 
science  altogether,  because  it  is  not  capable  of i  arriving  at 
results  which  are  mathematically  exact.  But  it  is  to  this,  on 
the  contrary,  that  it  owes,  in  certain  aspects,  its  superiority 
and  its  greatness.  It  cannot  pretend  to  arrive  at  conclusions 
which  are  absolutely  exact,  because  its  speculations  have  to 
do,  not  with  abstract  and  perfectly  defined  elements,  but 
with  the  wants  and  with  the  actions  of  man,  a  free  and 
moral  being,  "  ondoyant  et  divers,  who  is  obedient  to  motives 
which  are  alike  incapable  of  being  precisely  determined,  or 
especially  of  being  measured  by  figures. 

The  generalty  of  economists,  either  by  the  definition  which 
they  give  to  the  object  of  their  studies,  or  by  the  conception 
which  they  have  of  their  mission,,  make  it  a  science  of  observ- 
ation and  of  description,  or,  as  M.  Coquelin  says,  "  a  branch 
of  the  natural  history  of  man."  This  writer  gives  the  follow- 
ing clearer  expression  of  his  idea:  "Anatomy  studies  man  in 
the  physical  constitution  of  his  being  ;  physiology  in  the  play 
of  his  organs  ;  natural  history  (  according  to  the  practice  of 
Buffon  and  his  successors),  in  his  habits,  his  instincts,  his  wants, 
and  in  reference  to  the  place  which  he  occupies  in  the  scale  of 

*M.  A.  Walras  published  in  1831  a  work  entitled  The  Nature  of  Wealth  and  the  Origin  of 
Value,  in  the  eighteenth  chapter  of  which  he  endeavors  to  demonstrate  "that  political  economy 
is  a  mathematical  science."  See  also  Stanley  Jevons'  Theory  of  Political  Economy,  1871. 
Leon  Walras,  Elements  of  Pure  Political  Economy,  1874.  Cournot  published  in  1830  his 
Researches  into  the  Mathematical  Principles  of  the  Theory  of  Wealth. 


10  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

being ;  political  economy  considers  him  in  the  combination 
of  his  works.  One  of  the  most  interesting  studies  of  the 
naturalist  is  to  watch  the  labors  of  the  bee  in  its  hive,  to 
study  its  order,  its  combinations,  and  its  progress.  The 
economist,  in  so  far  as  he  cultivates  the  science  only,  does 
exactly  the  same  in  respect  to  that  intelligent  bee  called 
man  ;  he  observes  the  order,  the  progress,  and  the  combina- 
tion of  his  labors.  The  two  studies  are  of  precisely  the  same 
nature." 

According  to  this,  it  is  obvious  that  political  economy  is 
not  a  moral  science.  It  does  not  deal  with  a  good  to  be 
realized,  nor  with  an  ideal  to  be  attained,  nor  with  duties  to 
be  fulfilled  ;  it  suffices  for  it  to  observe  and  to  describe  the 
methods  by  which  the  human  animal  labors  for  the  satisfac- 
tion of  his  wants.  Such  was  the  impression  of  J.  B.  Say, 
when  he  placed  at  the  beginning  of  his  famous  treatise,  and 
as  a  title  to  that  renowned  work,  this  definition  which  has 
been  ever  since  repeated,  Treatise  on  Political  Economy,  or  a 
simple  Explanation  of  the  manner  in  which  wealth  is  created,  dis- 
tributed, and  consumed.  Bastiat,  with  that  precision  of  language, 
that  vivacity  and  brilliancy  of  style  which  often  conceal  the 
want  of  profundity  of  his  ideas,  insists  strongly  on  making 
political  economy  a  purely  descriptive  science.  "  Political 
economy,"  he  says,  "  exacts  nothing,  and  indeed  counsels 
nothing,  it  describes  how  wealth  is  created  and  distributed,  in 
the  same  way  that  physiology  describes  the  action  of  our 
organs."  Bastiat  endeavored  to  increase  the  authority  of 
economical  principles  by  attributing  to  them  the  objective, 
disinterested,  impersonal  character  of  the  natural  sciences.  He 
forgot  that  of  free  trade  all  his  writings  and  his  active  pro- 
pagandism  contradicted  his  definition. 

In  a  very  well  written  book,  but  one  in  which  the  exact- 
ness of  the  reasoning  makes  only  the  more  apparent  the. 
error  of  the  premises  when  they  are  false,  Antoine-Elisee 
Cherbuliez  expresses  the  idea  of  J.  B.  Say,  of  Bastiat,  and  of 
Coquelin,  with  still  greater  clearness.  "  Political  economy," 
he  says,  "  is  not  the  science  of  human  life,  nor  of  social  life, 
nor  even  that  of  the  well-being  of  mankind.  It  would  still 
exist,  and  would  change  neither  its  object  nor  its  end,  if 
riches,  instead  of  contributing  to  our  well-being,  did  not 
enter  into  it  at  all,  provided  that  they  continued  to  be  pro- 
duced, to  circulate,  and  to  be  distributed."* 

This  author,  in  order  to  give  to  the  science  an  absolute 
character,  which  it  cannot  have,  enunciates  an  hypothesis 
which  is  clearly  contradictory.  He  forgets  that  a  given 
object  is  definable  as  wealth  only  because  it  answers  to  some 

*See  Cherbuliez,  Precis  de  la  Science  Economique,  vol.  i.  M.  Cherbuliez  held  strongly  to 
the  idea  of  constituting  a  pure  political  economy  similar  to  pure  mathematics.  "  Economical 
science,"  said  he,  "  has  for  its  object  the  discovery  of  truth,  not  the  production  of  a  practical 
result;  of  enlightening  men,  not  of  rendering  them  better  or  happier;  and  the  truths  which  it 
discovers  can  only  be  theories,  or  conclusions  based  on  those  theories,  not  imperative  rules,  nor 
precepts  of  individual  conduct,  nor  of  administration." 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  II 

one  of  our  wants,  and  contributes  to  our  well-being.  To  con- 
ceive of  wealth  which  does  not  enter  into  our  well-being  is  to 
admit  that  there  is  wealth  which  is  not  wealth. 

The  economists  who  ascribe  to  political  economy  the  rigor 
of  the  exact  sciences,  or  the  objective  character  of  the  natural 
sciences,  forget  that  it  is  a  moral  science.  Now,  the  moral  . 
sciences  do  not  confine  themselves  to  discussing  what  is,  but  I 
declare  also  what  ought  to  be.  A  strange  moralist  would  he  / 
be  who  should  content  himself  with  analyzing  the  passions/ 
of  man,  and  who  should  neglect  also  to  speak  to  him  of  hi3 
duties  !  The  object  of  morality  is  precisely  this,  to  deter- 
mine what  we  owe  to  God,  to  our  fellows,  and  to  ourselves  ; 
what  things  we  ought  to  do  or  to  avoid  doing,  in  order  to 
arrive  at  the  degree  of  perfection  which  it  is  given  us  to 
attain.  So  of  political  science,  it  is  not  enough  to  enumerate 
the  different  forms  of  government  which  exist,  nor  even  to 
trace  an  ideal  constitution  for  perfect  men  ;  it  must  also 
teach  us  what  are  the  institutions  fitted  to  a  given  people,  or 
a  given  situation,  and  what  are  those  most  favorable  to  the 
progress  of  the  human  race.  Thus,  it  will  not  only  place 
despotism,  which  stifles  human  spontaneity,  on  a  different 
footing  from  liberty,  which  develops  our  most  noble  qualities, 
but  it  ought  also  to  declare  the  conditions  on  which  free 
institutions  can  endure,  and  what  errors  and  what  weak- 
nesses render  a  despotic  government  inevitable. 

In  like  manner,  the  economist  cannot  stop  with  describing 
how  riches  are  produced  and  distributed.  That  of  itself 
would  be  a  long  study,  and  a  much  more  difficult  one  than 
Say  and  his  disciples  seem  to  suspect  ;  for  it  is  not  enough 
to '  learn  what  is  going  on  in  a  single  country,  since  the 
modes  of  production  and  distribution  vary  in  different 
nations.  But  that  is  only  the  smallest  part  of  the  task  of 
the  true  economist ;  he  must  also  show  how  men  ought  to 
organize  themselves,  how  they  ought  to  produce  and  dis- 
tribute wealth,  to  the  end  that  they  may  be  as  well  provided 
as  possible  with  the  things  which  constitute  their  well-being. 
Nor  is  this  all  ;  he  must  also  search  out  the  practical  methods 
of  attaining  the  object  which  he  indicates.  Thus  he  finds  in 
a  certain  country  inland  customs  duties  between  province  and 
province,  or  octrois  which  arrest  exchanges  at  the  entrance  at 
all  cities ;  shall  he  confine  himself  to  a  mere  statement  of 
these  facts,  as  a  naturalist  would  do,  or  as  Bastiat  and  Cher- 
buliez  advise  ?  Evidently  not  ;  he  must  point  out  the  per- 
nicious consequences  of  these  institutions ;  he  must  counsel 
the  abolition  of  them,  and  endeavor  to  show  how  it  can  be 
done.  If  he  lives  in  a  country  which  endeavors  to  increase 
its  power  and  happiness  by  making  itself  distrusted  by  its 
neighbors,  through  the  extent  of  its  military  armaments,  he 
will  not  hesitate  to  point  out  that  a  people  can  have  no 
interest  in  rendering  others  subservient  to  it,  or  in  weakening 


12  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

them  ;  and  that  a  nation  cannot  sell  its  costly  products  to 
advantage,  unless  it  has  rich  neighbors  who  are  in  a  condi- 
tion to  pay  for  them.  Have  not  economists  themselves,  M. 
Bastiat  at  their  head — forgetting  their  definitions,  devoted 
their  whole  energy  to  recommending,  and  to  demanding  the 
abolition  of  protective  tariffs  ?  Were  they  content  to  observe 
and  to  describe  only,  when  they  founded  their  system  of  Free 
Trade,  and  were  running  from  meeting  to  meeting  to  secure 
demonstrations  in  its  favor? 

There  is  a  fundamental  difference  between  the  natural 
sciences  and  political  economy,  which  has  not  been  suffi- 
ciently emphasized.  The  former  are  occupied  with  the 
phenomena  of  nature,  irresistible  forces  which  we  can  only 
indicate  but  cannot  modify.  The  moral  sciences,  and  politi- 
cal economy  among  them,  are  occupied  with  human  facts, 
emanations  of  our  free  will,  which  we  have  power  to  modify 
in  such  a  manner  as  to  render  them  more  conformable  to 
the  requirements  of  justice,  of  duty,  and  of  our  well-being. 
Observe  also  that  the  economists  and  the  naturalists  proceed 
by  a  different  method.  The  latter  observe  the  overthrow  of 
cities  by  earthquakes,  the  increasing  rigor  of  the  climate  of 
planets,  and  the  disappearance  in  them  of  every  trace  of 
animal  or  vegetable  life.  They  seek  to  discover  the  causes 
of  these  phenomena,  but  they  make  no  pretense  of  modifying 
them.  Economists,  on  the  contrary,  when  they  encounter 
laws,  ordinances,  or  customs,  prejudicial  to  the  growth  of 
human  welfare,  contend  with  them  and  try  to  accomplish  their 
overthrow.  Like  the  physician,  who,  after  having  made  a 
diagnosis  of  the  disease,  points  out  the  remedy,  so  the  econo- 
mist should  first  satisfy  himself  of  the  nature  of  the  evils 
from  which  society  suffers,  and  afterwards  point  out  the 
methods  by  which  those  evils  may  be  cured.  TRoscher 
declared  that  political  economy  was  the  physiology  of  the 
social  body.  It  is  indeed  that,  but  it  is  something  more,  it 
is  also  its  therapeutics.j[ 

What  has  entailed  grave  errors  and  essentially  narrowed  the 
range  of  economic  studies,  is  the  fundamental  idea,  common 
to  Adam  Smith,  and  to  most  of  the  philosophers  of  his  time, 
that  social  phenomena  are  regulated  by  natural  laws,  which, 
but  for  the  vices  of  institutions,  would  lead  men  to  happi- 
ness. The  philosophers  of  the  eighteenth  century  believed  in 
the  innate  goodness  of  man,  and  in  a  natural  order.  It  was 
the  fundamental  dogma  of  their  philosophy  and  of  their  pol- 
itics. Sir  Henry  Maine  has  shown  that  this  theory  sprang 
from  the  Greek  philosophy  passing  under  the  influence  of  the 
Roman  jurists,  and  of  the  Renaissance.  Rousseau  is  continu- 
ally repeating  that  "everything  is  good  which  comes  from  the 
hands  of  nature."  "Man  is  naturally  good,"  says  Turgot.  It 
was  upon  this  idea,  applied  to  the  government  of  societies, 
that  Quesnay  and  his  school  founded  their  doctrine,  which  they 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  13 

very  properly  styled  Physiocratic,  or  the  government  of  nature; 
that  is  to  say,  the  empire  restored  to  natural  laws  by  the  abol- 
ition of  all  human  laws  which  interfere  with  the  application  of 
them.  Adam  Smith  borrowed  from  the  Physiocrates  the  fund- 
amental ideas  of  his  famous  treatise  on  the  Wealth  of  Nations, 
a  work  which  he  would  have  dedicated  to  Quesnay,  if  the 
death  of  that  learned  man  had  not  prevented.  He  believes, 
with  the  Physiocrates,  in  the  order  of  nature.  "Suppress  all 
hindrances,"  said  he,  "and  a  simple  system  of  natural  liberty 
will  establish  itself."  Mr.  Cliffe  Leslie,  in  his  excellent  work 
on  the  Political  Economy  of  Adam  Smith,  has  explained  how 
this  system  of  unlimited  freedom,  which  was  founded  on  the 
idea  then  entertained  of  the  goodness  of  man  and  the  per- 
fectness  of  nature,  came  to  be  established  in  the  eighteenth 
century.  Out  of  it  sprang  that  grand  movement  of  civiliza- 
tion which  aspires  after  religious  and  civil  liberty,  and  the 
equality  of  human  rights,  and  which  is  ever  in  revolt  against 
the  tyranny  of  priests  and  kings.  Perceiving  that  governments 
and  bad  laws  impoverished  nations  by  iniquitous  taxation, 
enthralled  labor  by  absurd  ordinances,  and  ruined  agriculture 
by  crushing  exactions,  the  philosophers  of  that  era  occupied 
themselves  with  social  questions,  and  arrived,  of  necessity,  at 
the  point  of  demanding  the  abolition  of  all  those  human  insti- 
tutions, with  a  view  to  the  attainment  of  that  better  order 
which  they  called  natural  right,  natural  liberty,  the  code  of 
nature.  It  was  under  the  inspiration  of  those  ideas  that 
the  Physiocrates  in  France,  and  Adam  Smith  in  England, 
traced  the  progress  of  economic  reforms,  and  that  the  French 
revolution  attempted  its  political  ameliorations.  The  starting 
point  of  this  profound  evolution,  which,  for  a  time,  led  all 
Europe  captive,  people  and '  sovereigns  alike,  from  Naples  to 
St.  Petersburg,  was  an  enthusiastic  confidence  in  reason  and 
in  the  sentiments  of  man,  as  well  as  in  the  order  of  the 
universe  ;  it  was  the  optimism  of  Leibnitz,  descended  from 
the  clouds  of  philosophic  abstraction,  and  made  applicable  to 
the  organization  of  society.  The  good  sense  of  Voltaire  led 
him  to  perceive  the  falsity  of  this  system,  and  he  wrote 
Candide  and  la  Destruction  de  Lisbonne.  Rousseau,  in  a  letter 
of  touching  eloquence,  defended  optimism,  which  is  the  basis 
of  his  philosophy  as  well  as  of  that  of  his  epoch,  and  of  the 
French  revolution.  Strangely  enough,  it  was  Fourier  who 
deduced  the  ultimate  consequences  of  the  physiocratic  opti- 
mism of  the  economists.  The  selfishness  and  the  vices  of  man- 
kind seemed  to  give  the  lie  to  the  system  which  maintains 
that  all  is  well,  and  that  with  liberty  everything  arranges 
itself  for  the  best,  in  the  best  of  worlds.  It  had  been  truly 
said  that  the  vices  of  individuals  contributed  to  the  general 
well-being.  Adam  Smith  had  also  maintained  that  men,  sim- 
ply by  pursuing  their  own  interests,  uniformly  did  the  things 
most  advantageous  to  the  nation  ;  and  that  the  rich,  for 


14  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

example,  in  seeking  merely  the  satisfaction  of  their  caprices, 
accomplished  the  most  favorable  distribution  of  products, 
'cas  though  they  were  led  by  an  invisible  hand."  Notwith- 
standing this,  men  continued  to  say  that  selfishness  must  be 
resisted  and  vice  suppressed.  This  was  the  recognition  of  a 
disturbing  element ;  things  did  not  then  arrange  themselves 
for  the  best,  in  virtue  of  absolute  freedom.  Fourier,  whose 
logic  was  restrained  neither  by  the  absurd  nor  the  immoral, 
constructed,  like  Plato,  an  ideal  city,  the  phalanstery,  where 
all  the  passions  were  made  use  of  as  productive  forces,  and 
the  vices  transformed  into  elements  of  order  and  stability  ; 
where,  consequently,  there  was  no  longer  anything  to  repress. 
This  was,  in  truth,  natural  liberty,  the  reign  of  nature.  Order 
was  created  out  of  disorder.  Like  M.  Caussidiere,  in  1848, 
Pierre  Leroux  has  clearly  shown  that  Fourier  found  the 
germ  of  his  system  in  the  voyages  of  Bougainville,  which  pre- 
sented to  the  eighteenth  century,  in  the  paradise  of  the  island 
of  Otaheite,  a  picture  of  the  happiness  which  the  natural  man 
enjoys  when  emancipated  from  laws  and  human  convention- 
alities. Diderot  echoed  the  enthusiasm  which  this  piquant 
sketch  of  primitive  manners  evoked.  It  wras  a  logical  con- 
clusion: if  all  is  well  in  nature,  it  is  the  natural  man  who 
ought  to  be  our  model.  Absolute  laissez  faire  conducts  us,  at 
last,  to  the  island  of  Tahiti. 

Down  to  the  present  day,  the  majority  of  economists  have 
remained  in  subjection  to  the  ideas  of  physiocratic  optimism, 
which  prevailed  at  the  birth  of  their  science,  as  well  in 
France  as  in  England.  They  constantly  speak  of  the  natural 
order  ,of  societies  and  of  natural  laws.  They  invoke  these 
only  and  desire  to  see  only  these  prevail.  Not  to  multiply 
citations,  I  shall  borrow  only  a  single  passage  from  one  of 
the  most  eminent  and  least  systematic  of  contemporary  econ- 
omists, M.  Hyppolite  Passy.  "  Political  economy,"  says  M. 
Passy,  "  is  the  science  of  the  laws  in  virtue  of  which  wealth 
is  created,  distributed,  and  consumed.  We  have  only  to 
ascertain  these  laws  and  to  apply  them.  The  object  to  be 
attained  is  the  greatest  good  of  all,  but  the  most  enlightened 
economists  do  not  hesitate  to  believe  that  natural  laws  con- 
duce to  this  result  and  that  they  alone  conduce  to  it,  and  that 
it  is  impossible  for  men  to  substitute  their  individual  con- 
ceptions for  Divine  wisdom."  This  is  a  perfect  summing  up 
of  the  pure  doctrine  of  the  economists  on  this  point.  Now,  it 
will  be  easy  to  show,  that  an  idea  embodied  in  it  is  utterly 
unsound,  that  it  answers  to  nothing  real,  and  is  in  radical 
opposition  to  Christianity  and  to  facts. 

I  search  for  these  "natural  laws"  which  the  economists  are 
constantly  talking  about,  and  I  do  not  find  them.  I  understand 
that  these  words  are  employed  where  the  question  concerns 
the  phenomena  of  the  physical  universe,  which  do,  in  fact, 
from  the  infinitely  little  which  we  know  of  them,  seem  to 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  15 

obey  immutable  laws.  I  will  admit,  also,  that  we  invoke 
natural  laws  for  animals,  which,  live  and  obtain  their  suste- 
nance in  a  similar  manner,  but  not  for  man,  that  perfectible 
being,  whose  manners,  customs,  and  institutions  are  changing 
ceaselessly.  The  laws  which  govern  the  production  and 
especially  the  distribution  of  wealth,  are  very  different  in 
different  countries,  and  in  different  times.  Where,  then,  are 
these  natural  laws  in  force  ?  Is  it,  as  Rousseau,  Diderot,  and 
Bougainville  supposed,  in  those  islands  of  the  Pacific  where 
the  spontaneous  'products  of  the  soil  permit  men  to  live 
without  labor,  in  the  bosom  of  an  innocent  community  of 
goods  and  of  women  ?  Is  it  in  antiquity,  where  the  slavery 
of  the  laborer  procured  for  a  chosen  elite  of  citizens,  the 
means  of  attaining  to  the  ideal  of  a  genuine  aristocracy  ?  Is  it 
in  the  middle  ages,  under  the  reign  of  feudalism  and  of  cor- 
porations, in  that  golden  age  when  the  papacy  dominated 
over  nations  and  over  kings  ?  Is  it  in  Russia,  where  the  land 
belongs  to  the  Czar,  to  the  nobles,  and  to  the  communes 
which  parcel  out  the  territory,  at  stated  intervals,  among  all 
the  inhabitants  ?  Is  it  in  England,  where,  owing  to  primo- 
geniture, the  soil  is  monopolized  by  a  small  number  of  fami- 
lies, or  in  France,  where  the  laws  of  the  revolution  divide 
the  territory  among  five  millions  of  proprietors,  at  the  risk 
of  crumbling  it  into  particles  ? 

Industrial  wealth  was  formerly  produced  under  the  domes- 
tic roof  of  the  artisan  assisted  by  a  few  companions  ;  now 
it  is  produced  in  vast  workshops  by  an  army  of  workmen, 
tied  to  the  inexorable  movements  of  machinery  propelled  by 
steam  ;  which  of  these  two  methods  is  conformable  to  the 
natural  order  ?  In  a  primitive  state  of  society,  the  soil  was 
the  undivided  property  of  the  tribe,  and  this  disposition  of 
it  was  so  general  that  it  might,  without  doubt,  have  been 
recognized  as  a  natural  law.  At  the  present  time,  in  countries 
which  have  reached  the  industrial  stage,  individual  property, 
which  formerly  did  not  exist  except  in  respect  of  movables, 
is  applicable  also  to  the  realty  :  is  there,  in  this  change,  any 
violation  of  the  Providential  order?  Under  the  influence  of 
new  ideas  of  justice  and  of  certain  economic  necessities,  all 
social  institutions  are  modified,  and  it  is  probable  that  they 
will  be  modified  still  further.  If  we  believe  them  to  be  still 
imperfect,  we  should  not  be  forbidden  to  seek  to  modify  them. 
"  Laissons  faire"  cry  the  economists,  "  liberty  meets  all  wants." 
Doubtless,  but  what  shall  I  do  ?  Laws  do  not  make  them- 
selves, it  is  we,  ourselves,  who  vote  them ;  and  it  devolves 
upon  the  economist  to  show  me  what  the  laws  are  which 
ought  to  be  enacted.  He  will,  doubtless,  say,  with  M.  Passy, 
"  It  is  not  for  man  to  substitute  his  individual  conceptions 
for  those  of  the  Divine  wisdom."  But  is,  then,  the  civil  code 
which  to-day  regulates  the  distribution  of  property  in  France 
an  emanation  of  the  Divine  wisdom  ?  Is  it  not  rather  the 


l6  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

product  of  the  juridical  conceptions  of  the  men  of  the  French 
revolution  ?  When,  like  M.  Le  Play,  it  is  sought  to  restore 
the  liberty  of  testamentary  disposition,  or  when  it  is  proposed, 
as  in  the  Belgian  Chambers,  to  limit  the  degrees  of  consan- 
guinity in  the  succession  to  intestates,  is  there,  in  these,  a 
violation  of  the  decrees  of  Divine  wisdom  ?  The  economists 
forget  that  the  bases  of  every  economic  regulation  among 
civilized  peoples  are  laws  framed  by  legislators,  which  are, 
consequently,  subject  to  be  changed,  if  need  be,  and  not 
pretended,  immutable,  natural  laws  to  which  we  must  submit 
blindly  and  forever. 

In  societate  aut  vis,  aut  lex  viget,  says  Bacon  ;  if  you  do  not 
choose  to  submit  to  the  dominion  of  laws,  you  will  fall  under 
the  dominion  of  force.  With  men  in  a  state  of  nature,  every- 
thing belongs  to  the  strongest.  It  is  the  duty  of  the  State, 
on  the  contrary,  to  cause  justice  to  preside  over  the  distri- 
bution of  property,  in  order  that  each  person  may  enjoy  the 
fruits  of  his  own  labor.  Suppress  all  intervention  of  the 
State,  and  apply  the  absolute  doctrine  of  laissez  faire,  and 
everything,  as  Bonnet  says,  is  subject  to  be  preyed  upon; 
( tout  est  en  proie^]  The  best-armed  slays  the  one  who  is  least 
prepared  for  the  battle  ;  and  he  either  feeds  upon  his  flesh 
or  on  the  products  of  his  labor.  This  is  precisely  what  hap- 
pens among  animals,  where,  in  that  strife  for  existence,  of 
which  Darwin  speaks,  the  best  endowed  species  take  the 
place  of  those  which  are  less  so.  The  Positivist  economists 
also  say,  following  the  idea  of  Darwin,  that  every  superior 
position  is  the  consequence  of  superior  aptitudes  in  him  who 
has  conquered  it.  Everything  which  is,  is  well.  Every  man 
has,  everywhere,  the  well-being  to  which  he  is  entitled,  just 
as  every  country  has  the  government  which  it  deserves.  So 
much  the  worse  for  the  weak  and  the  simple,  room  for  the 
strong  and  the  able !  Might  does  not  hold  dominion  over' 
right,  but  might  is  the  necessary  attribute  of  right.  Such  is 
the  natural  law. 

Those  who  are  constantly  invoking  natural  laws,  and  who 
repel  what  they  call  artificial  organizations,  forget  that  the 
government  of  civilized  countries  is  the  result  of  political  and 
economic  art,  and  that  the  natural  government  is  that  of 
savage  tribes.  Among  them,  in  fact,  the  law  of  Darwin  domin- 
ates as  among  the  animal  species  :  there  are  no  ordinances,  no 
State,  no  restraints,  but  perfect  liberty  in  all  things  and  for 
all  men.  Such  was,  indeed,  the  ideal  of  Rousseau,  ever  faith- 
ful to  the  doctrine  of  the  code  of  nature.'  Civilization,  on 
the  contrary,  consists  in  struggling  against  nature.  Just  in 
the  degree  that  agriculture  and  industry  attain  perfection, 
more  and  more  employment  is  given  to  artificial  methods, 
invented  by  science,  for  procuring  for  us  wherewith  to  sat- 
isfy our  needs.  Through  the  art  of  healing  and  of  main- 
taining health,  we  wrestle  with  the  diseases  with  which  nature 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  LJ 

afflicts    us,  and    thus   prolong   an  average  of   twenty   years   to 
forty. 

It  is  by  the  art  of  government  that  statesmen  obtain  the 
supremacy  of  order  and  permit  men  to  labor  and  to  better 
their  condition,  instead  of  endlessly  warring  on  each  other 
like  wolves,  either  for  vengeance  or  for  defense.  It  is  to  the 
art  of  making  good  laws  that  we  owe  the  security  of  prop- 
erty and  of  life.  It  is  by  fighting  against  our  passions  that 
we  succeed  in  accomplishing  our-  duties.  Everything  is  the 
product  of  art,  because  civilization  is  in  everything  the  oppo- 
site of  a  state  of  nature.  The.  child  of  nature  is  not  that 
good  and  reasonable  being  dreamt  of  by  the  philosophers  ; 
he  is  a,  selfish  animal,  who  seeks  to  satisfy  his  desires  with- 
out caring  for  the  rights  of  others,  regardless  of  wrong,  slay- 
ing whomsoever  makes  resistance  to  him,  and  it  is  not 
too  much  to  compel  him,  by  all  the  restraints  of  morality,  of 
religion,  and  of  laws,  to  bend  to  the  exactness  of  social 
order.  We.  must  conquer  the  savage  element  in  him,  or  he 
puts  civilization  itself  in  peril.  It  is,  therefore,  a  dangerous 
error  to  suppose  that  w.£  need  only  to  disarm  the  State,  and 
to  liberate  mankind  from  all  restraints,  that  the  supremacy  of 
order  may  be  established. 

I  can  discover   in    political  economy  but    one  single  natural 
law,  namely,  this,  that   man,    in   oroler   to   live,  must   make   a 
living.     All   the   rest   is   governed   by    habits,    by   customs,  by 
laws  which  are  continually  changing,  and  which,  just  in  pro- 
portion as   justice  and  morality  enlarge   their  sphere,  are  fur- 
ther and  further  removed  from  that  natural  order  over  which 
force  and  chance  preside.     If   there   is  any  natural  law  which 
seems  to  be  indisputable,  it   is   that  which    commands  all  liv- 
ing beings  to  obtain  subsistence    by  their   own  efforts.     Man- 
kind has,  nevertheless,  succeeded  in  emancipating  itself   from 
that  law,  and,  by  means  of  slavery  and  serfdom,  the  stronger 
have    been    able    to    live    in    idleness    at    the   expense    of    the 
weaker.     No   doubt,    whatever   happens    is   the   result   of   cer-  / 
tain    necessities    which    may,    in    strictness,    be     denominated/ 
natural  ;   but  it  is  by  resisting   those  necessities  that  progress  / 
and    perfection    are   attained    in    human    societies.     From    the  I 
mere  fact  that  institutions  or   laws   exist,  it  by  no  means  fol- 
lows that  they  are   necessary,  immutable,  and  alone  conform- 
able to  the  natural  order. 

The  physiocratic  optimism  which  has  inspired  political  <. 
economy  from  its  inception,  and  which  is  interwoven,  at  the 
present  time,  with  all  its  speculations,  is  not  on-ly  contra- 
dicted by  facts,  but  is  opposed  to  the  fundamental  principle 
of  Christianity.  A  certain  school  has  reproached  political 
economy  with  being  an  immoral  science,  because  it  urges 
man  to  the  pursuit  of  nothing  but  his  own  material  advant- 
age, and  to  live  only  for  sensual  gratification.  Since  it  is 
the  object  of  political  economy  to  find  cut  how  societies 


l8  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

ought   to  be i  organized,  in   order   to   arrive  at  a   condition  of 
general  well-being,  it   is  nothing  more    than  a   revolt   against 
asceticism,  and  not  against  Christianity,  which,  by  no  means, 
requires  of  us  to  give  up  everything;  but  the  idea  that  order 
is  established  spontaneously  in  society,  as  in  the  universe,  by 
virtue   of   natural   laws,  is    entirely  opposed    to   the   Christian 
idea    both    of   the    world    and   of   humanity.       According    to 
Christianity  man    is    so    thoroughly  depraved    that  it    requires 
the  direct  intervention    of   God  and    the  constant  working   of 
His   grace  to   keep  him  in   the   right  way  and    to   accomplish 
his  salvation  ;  the  world  itself  is  so  much  a  prey  to  evil  that 
Christians  long  ago  expected,  and  in  certain  sects  still  expect, 
the  palingencsia,  "  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth,"  according  to 
the   Messianic    promises.     The   evil    that   is   within    us,   there- 
fore, must  be  put  under  subjection  by  the  sentiment  of  duty, 
and  that  which  is  outside  of  us,  by  laws  inspired  by  a  senti- 
ment   of    justice.       If    we    are    to    hold    with    the    orthodox 
economists,  that    the  better  order  of   things  arrived  at  results 
spontaneously  from    unlimited   laissez  faire,   we   must   suppose 
man    either   to    be    good,    or   to    be    necessarily   obedient   to 
inspirations  which  make  him  act  in  conformity  to  the  general 
good.     This  idea  is  not  only  the  opposite  of  Christianity,  but 
it  is  also  contradicted    by  facts.     If   the  human  animal    is  let 
loose    you    have  the    warfare   of   all    against    all,    the   bellum 
omnium  contra  omnes  of   Hobbes.     We  find  this  warfare  first  in 
the  caverns  of  the  pre-historic  times,  the  home  of  cannibalism, 
later  in  the  forests  of   the  barbarous  age,  and  at   the   present 
day   in   the   haunts  of   industry.     Even    in    nature   there   does 
not  prevail  an  order  of  justice  which  we  could  safely  take  as 
our  exemplar ;   the    utmost   that    we    find    in   her    is    a    rude 
species   of   equilibrium   which  we   call   the  natural   order.     In 
nature,  as    in  history,  injustice   often    triumphs  and  justice    is 
overborne.    When  a  king-fisher  has,  by  patience  and  address, 
succeeded  in  seizing  its  prey  and    is  bearing  it   homeward  to 
its    hungry    offspring,    and    an    eagle,    freebooter    of    the   air, 
pounces    on    it,    and    robs    it   of   the   fruit    of   its   labors,    the 
same  sentiment   of  justice  is  aroused   in  us,  as  when  an    idle 
master  forces   his  bondman    to  maintain    him  on   the  product 
of   his  toil.     If   Cain,  the   follower  of   the  chase  and  the  war- 
rior, kills  Abel,  the  peaceful   shepherd,  we  side  with   the  vic- 
tim against   the  assassin.     Thus  it   is   that  we  are   constantly 
revolting    against   facts    which   take    place    in    nature   and   in 
society.     The    Chinese,    and    those   excellent   women   who   see 
in  every  event  that   happens  an  effect  of   the  Divine  will,  are 
optimists  after  the  manner  of   the   economists  who  believe   in 
the  empire  of  natural   laws.     Physiocratic  optimism  also  puts 
its  trust  in  the  judgment  of  God  and  in  the  ordeals  which  are 
found   among  all   nations,  for   the  custom    of   ordeals   springs 
out  of   the  idea  that   God  always  causes  the   innocent   to  tri- 
umph.    Job,    on   the  contrary,    protests   against   this   immoral 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  19 

doctrine,  and  the  children  of  Israel,  down-trodden  and  scat- 
tered among  the  nations,  do  not  yet  despair  of  justice,  but 
await  the  hour  of  recompense.  The  facts  which  exist  and 
the  present  organization  of  society  are,  doubtless,  the  neces- 
sary result  of  certain  causes,  but  those  causes  are  not  natural 
laws,  they  are  human  facts  :  ideas,  manners,  beliefs,  which 
may  be  modified,  and  from  the  modification  of  which  other 
laws  and  other  customs  will  be  deduced. 

The  theory  of  natural  laws  has  had  two  other  unfortunate 
consequences  :  it  -has  discarded  all  notion  of  an  ideal  to  be 
attained,  and  has  very  considerably  narrowed  the  conclusions 
of  political  economy.  In  the  writings  of  the  orthodox 
economists,  the  final  object  to  be  striven  for  is  never  men- 
tioned, nor  the  reforms  which  justice  might  demand.  Does 
distribution  take  place  in  the  way  most  favorable  to  the  pro- 
gress of  humanity  and  to  the  happiness  of  all  ?  Is  consump- 
tion conformable  to  moral  laws  ?  Is  it  not  desirable  that 
there  should  be  less  of  hardship  among  the  lower  classes 
and  less  of  luxury  among  the  upper  ?  Have  we  not  economic 
duties  to  fulfill  ?  Since  the  primitive  era,  the  organization  of 
society  has  been  materially  modified  ;  will  it  not  undergo  still 
further  changes,  and  in  what  direction  ?  These  are  some  of 
the  questions  which  official  political  economy  never  touches, 
because  they  do  not,  it  is  alleged,  enter  into  its  domain.  We 
have  seen  that  Bastiat  and  Cherbuliez  point  out  the  reasons. 
The  strict  science  does  not  concern  itself  with  what  ought  to 
be  but  only  with  what  is ;  it  can,  therefore,  neither  propose 
an  ideal"  nor  labor  to  attain  it.  It  simply  describes  how 
riches  are  produced,  distributed  and  consumed  ;  and  thence 
results  the  poverty  of  its  practical  conclusions.  In  short,  if 
it  were  enough  simply  to  proclaim  liberty  in  order  that  every- 
thing should  arrange  itself  in  the  best  way,  and  that  har- 
mony might  be  established,  the  office  of  political  economy  is 
very  nearly  ended  in  countries  which,  like  England,  the 
Netherlands  ,and  Switzerland,  have  adopted  free  trade  and 
free  competition.  It  will,  no  doubt,  nave  rendered  an  import- 
ant service  in  promoting  the  abolition  of  the  restraints  which 
prevented  the  expansion  of  productive  forces,  and  a  better 
distribution  of  labor ;  but  at  the  present  day  its  functions 
are  nearly  exhausted.  We  are  approaching  the  last  pages  of 
the  book,  and  there  will  soon  be  nothing  left  but  to  close  it 
and  to  lay, it  respectfully  on  the  shelf. 

On  this  point,  I  think,  the  criticisms  of  the  Socialists  of 
the  Chair  are  well  founded.  In  aiming  to  make  political 
economy  an  exact  science  its  domain  has  been  too  often  nar- 
rowed ;  it  cannot  separate  itself  from  politics,  morality,  law 
and  religion.  Since  it  tries  to  discover  how  men  can  best 
arrive  at  the  satisfaction  of  their  wants,  it  ought  to  tell  us 
what  are  the  forms  of  government,  of  property,  of  religious 
worship,  the  methods  of  distribution,  and  the  moral  and 


20  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

religious  ideas  most  favorable  to  the  production  of  wealth. 
It  ought  to  present  to  us  the  ideal  to  be  attained,  and  point 
out  the  way  of  reaching  it.  To  obtain  liberty  is  most  desir- 
able, but  we  ought  to  know  further  what  use  to  make  of  it. 
In  .civilized  society,  not  less  than  in  the  primitive  forest,  if 
liberty  is  not  put  under  the  restraints  and  ordinances  of 
morals  and  of  law,  it  ends  in  the  oppression  of  the  weak 
and  the  domination  of  the  stronger  and  more  capable  :  this 
will  speedily  occur  not  less  in  the  domain  of  economy  than 
in  that  of  education.  The  disciples  of  Darwin  will  say  that 
this  is  the  law  of  nature  and  of  "selection."  Very  well;  but 
if  it  has  the  effect  of  crushing  me  inexorably,  I  may,  at 
least,  be  excused  from  giving  it  my  blessing. 

Thus,  as  it  seems  to  me,  has  the  official  political  economy 
been  justly  reproached  with  enunciating  as  absolute  truths, 
propositions  which,  in  reality,  are  falsified  by  facts,  just  as 
though  in  mechanics  we  were  to  formulate  laws  of  motion 
without  taking  any  account  of  resistances  and  friction. 

It  is  these  abstract  and  general  formulas  which  have 
inspired  practical  statesmen  like  M.  Thiers  with  a  great  dis- 
trust of  economic  axioms.  Let  me  cite  some  examples  of 
these  axioms.  Since  the  time  of  Ricardo  it  has  been  a 
dogma  of  the  science  that  wages,  like  profits,  tend  to  equal- 
ize themselves,  because  free  competition  speedily  brings  an 
increased  supply  to  the  point  where  the  highest  remuneration 
is  to  be  obtained.  Now  Cliffe  Leslie  has  shown,  by  statistics 
gathered  both  in  England  and  on  the  Continent,  that  no 
such  equality  of  wages  really  exists ;  but  on  the  contrary, 
that  the  difference  of  compensations  for  the  same  industry, 
between  one  place  and  another,  is  greater  at  the  present  day 
than  formerly.* 

It  is  also  an  economic  axiom,  often  quoted  in  the  recent 
discussions  of  the  double  standard,  that  the  abundance  of 
silver  is  an  evil,  inasmuch  as  business  is  carried  on  just  as 
well  with  a  small  as  with  a  large  quantity  of  money.  And 
yet  the  daily  quotations  of  European  money  markets  prove 
that  a  scarcity  of  money  causes  crises,  while  an  abundance  of 
it  lowers  the  rate  of  discount,  and  gives,  in  consequence,  an 
impulse  to  production  and  to  transactions.  Free  trade  holds 
that  the  balance  of  trade  is  of  no  consequence,  because  prod- 
ucts are  exchanged  against  products,  and  we  have  only  to 
congratulate  ourselves  if  foreigners  furnish  us  commodities 
cheaper  than  our  own  people.  This  would  be  true  if  all 
peoples  composed  only  one  nation,  and  if  all  men  were  cap- 
italists. Take  the  case,  however,  of  a  nation  which  is 
obliged  to  sell  its  public  securities  and  shares  in  private 
corporations  abroad.  Products  are  exchanged  against  prod- 

*  In  Belgium  the  facts  are  very  curious.  At  the  moment  I  write  these  lines,  near  Ypres,  I 
am  paying  for  cutting  hay  a  franc  and  a  half  a  day  ;  in  the  neighborhood  of  Liege,  they  are 
paying  four  francs.  There,  a  day  laborer  earns  three  francs  or  three  francs  and  a  half;  in 
Campine  only  a  franc  and  a  quarter;  and  yet  the  farm  hand  in  Campine  performs  more  labor. 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  21 

ucts,  as  before,  but  it  is  henceforth  the  foreigner  owning 
these  securities,  who  enjoys  the  income  which  others  labor 
to  produce.  If  England  were  able  to  furnish  to  France  all 
manufactured  articles  more  cheaply  than  France  could  pro- 
duce them  at  home,  the  rich  consumers  in  France  would  be 
the  gainers,  but  French  workmen  would  be  deprived  of  work, 
and  would  either  disappear,  or  would  have  to  go  to  England 
to  pursue  their  occupations.  It  was  thus  that  in  France,  after 
the  suppression  of  provincial  tariffs,  industries  abandoned  the 
less  favored  localities  and  established  themselves  in  places 
where  they  met  with  more  advantageous  conditions.  Doubt- 
less, if  the  human  race  were  considered  from  a  cosmopolitan 
point  of  view,  and  if  all  nations  were  regarded  as  constitut- 
ing a  single  people,  it  would  matter  little  at  what  points 
population  centered  or  wealth  was  accumulated,  provided 
only  that  a  general  progress  resulted  ;  but  can  we  reasonably 
demand  of  any  people  such  a  disregard  of  its  own  peculiar 
interests  and  of  its  own  particular  future  ? 

Moreover,  if  we  consider  civilization  in  all  its  bearings,  and 
not  merely  the  accumulation  of  wealth,  is  it  not  desirable 
that  each  nationality  should  maintain  its  perfect  independence 
and  its  utmost  power,  in  order  that  each  shall  contribute  its 
own  peculiar  note  to  the  grand  harmony  of  human  society  ?  * 

Such,  at  least,  is  the  position  which  political  economy  has 
assumed  in  Germany  since  the  time  of  List ;  and  hence  in 
that  country  the  science  is  generally  called  the  Science  of 
National  Economy. 

It  seems  to  me,  also,  that  the  elder  economists  have 
attempted  to  abridge  too  much  the  functions  of  the  State. 
When  one  considers  all  the  injury  which  bad  Governments 
have  done  to  the  people,  especially  in  France,  one  under- 
stands the  desire  to  abridge  their  power  and  to  restrict  their 
functions  ;  but  the  laissez  faire  school,  in  theory  at  least,  has 
overstepped  the  line,  and  those  countries  which  should  abso- 
lutely follow  its  counsels  would  have  reason  to  repent  of 
them,  for  they  would  find  themselves  outstripped  by  others. 
England  has  come  to  a  recognition  of  this  truth,  and  although 
that  country  is  a  model  of  self  government,  so  far  from  per- 
severing in  the  course  marked  out  by  the  economists,  it  is 
every  year  imposing  new  functions  on  the  State,  which  now 
intervenes  in  industrial  and  agricultural  contracts,  with  a 
detail  and  with  restrictions  which  would  be  hardly  admitted 
elsewhere. 

In  Prussia,  everything  is  under  control  of  the  State  :  its 
lands,  its  military  establishment,  its  agriculture,  its  industry, 
its  religion,  and,  lastly,  its  education  of  all  grades — that 
principal  source  of  its  power.  From  being  once  no  more  than 

*  In  a  work  published  as  long  ago  as  1857,  I  made  use  of  what  is  called  the  new  method  : 
I  endeavored  in  it  to  show  that  the  free  traders  defended  a  just  cause  with  bad  arguments, 
and  a  useful  reform  with  indef-nsible  axioms.  See  Etudes  historiques  et  critiques  sur  la, 
liberte.  du  commerce  international. 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

the  sandy  wastes  of  the  Marquis  of  Brandenburg,  the  jest  of 
Voltaire  and  Frederick  II,  it  is  now  the  Empire  of  Germany. 
Some  years  ago,  a  President  of  New  Granada  on  assuming 
the  Presidential  chair,  being  imbued  with  pure  economic 
doctrines,  announced  that  "thereafter  the  State  would  con- 
fine itself  to  its  legitimate  functions,  and  would  leave  all  en- 
terprises to  individual  initiation."  The  economists  applauded. 
After  a  short  time  the  highways  were  impassible,  the  har- 
bors were  washed  away,  personal  security  was  at  an  end,  and 
education  abandoned  to  the  priests,  or,  in  other  words, 
reduced  to  nothing.  There  was  a  return  to  a  state  of  nature 
—to  the  primeval  forest.  In  Turkey  and  in  Greece  the  State 
does  nothing,  because  the  public  treasuries  are  empty  ;  it  is 
dangerous  even  to  visit  the  spot  in  order  to  attest  the  bene- 
fits of  the  system.  Let  us  suppose  two  countries,  side  by 
side,  of  equal  power  and  resources,  in  one  of  which  the 
Government  carefully  abstains  from  all  intervention,  and,  as 
a  consequence,  individual  necessities  exhaust  all  its  products ; 
in  the  other,  the  State  withholds  from  the  consumption  of 
individuals,  which  is  often  useless  and  even  hurtful,  the 
wherewithal  to  pay  for  all  services  affecting  the  public  inter- 
ests ;  it  opens  highways  and  harbors,  it  builds  railways, 
constructs  schoolhouses,  endows  liberally  all  scientific  estab- 
lishments, encourages  men  of  learning,  stimulates  the  higher 
arts  as  was  done  at  Athens,  and  finally,  by  means  of  obliga- 
tory education  and  obligatory  military  service,  takes  the  ris- 
ing generations  under  its  control  in  order  to  develop  their 
bodily  and  mental  forces. 

When  a  half  century  has  passed  by,  which  of  these  two 
peoples  will  be  the  more  highly  civilized,  the  richest,  the 
most  powerful  ?  In  Belgium,  the  State,  which,  since  1833,  has 
established  the  railway  system,  has  rendered  the  economical 
existence  of  the  country  secure  by  the  development  of  its 
industries,  in  spite  of  its  separation  from  Holland,  which 
deprived  it  of  its  principal  seaport.  It  is  in  a  similar  man- 
ner that  Italy  is,  at  the  present  day,  cementing  her  national 
unity,  and  that  Russia  is  laying  the  foundations  of  her  future 
greatness. 

The  State  has,  therefore,  a  double  mission  to  fulfill.  The 
first  part  of  it,  which  no  one  disputes,  but  the  full  scope  of 
which  few  persons  understand,  consists  in  subjecting  society 
to  the  rule  of  order  and  of  law  ;  that  is  to  say,  in  ordain- 
ing laws  as  nearly  conformable  to  distributive  justice  as  the 
advancement  of  social  culture  will  permit.  The  second  con- 
sists in  providing  out  of  the  public  purse,  through  means  of 
taxes  levied  proportionately  upon  individuals,  everything 
which  is  indispensable  to  progress,  and  for  which  private  ini- 
tiative is  not  sufficient. 

An  incontestable  merit  of  the  new  economists  is  that  they 
approach  the  study  of  the  social  question  with  a  true  senti- 


NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY.  2J 

ment  of  Christian  charity,  but  at  the  same  time  in  a  strictly 
scientific  spirit,  supporting  themselves  throughout  by  histori- 
cal facts,  and  thus  escaping  Utopian  theories. 

In  order  to  combat  the  socialists,  Bastiat  and  his  entire 
school  have  maintained  the  theory  of  a  natural  harmony  of 
interests,  and  have  thus  been  obliged  to  deny  the  existence 
of  any  problem  to  be  solved.  It  is  a  dangerous  error.  In 
truth,  the  social-  question  dates  very  far  back  ;  it  had  its 
origin  at  the  time  when  real  property  ceased  to  be  held  in 
common,  and,  as  a  consequence,  inequalities  of  condition 
began  to  show  themselves.  This  it  was  which  disturbed  the 
Greek  republics  and  hastened  their  downfall.  This  it  was 
which  agitated  the  Roman  republic  in  spite  of  the  palliative 
of  agrarian  laws,  again  and  again  renewed  in  vain.  It  reap- 
peared in  the  communities  of  the  middle  ages,  as  soon  as 
industry  had  acquired  some  headway  among  them,  and  later 
when  the  Reformation  had  established  religious  freedom  in 
society,  and  when  the  French  revolution  made  proclamation 
of  equality  and  fraternity ;  but  in  our  day  it  presents  so 
grave  and  general  a  character  as  to  compel  the  attention  of 
statesmen,  of  publicists,  and  especially  of  economists  ;  for  it 
involves  the  safety  of  civilization  itself,  put  in  peril  as  it  is 
oy  the  demands  of  the  working  classes. 

Economic  interests  will  always  be  found  among  the  prin- 
cipal causes  of  the  grander  evolutions  of  history — a  truth 
coarsely  expressed  by  Napoleon  when  he  said  :  "  TJie  seat  of 
revolutions  is  the  belly." 

The  new  economists  have  published  a  considerable  number 
of  special  studies  on  the  social  question  in  one  or  another 
of  its  phases,  and  as  they  pique  themselves  on  being  "  real- 
ists," that  is  to  say,  on  supporting  their  principles  by  statis- 
tics, they  must,  without  doubt,  contribute  to  the  advancement 
of  the  science.  In  its  summing  up,  the  new  doctrine  is  still 
somewhat  vague  both  as  to  premises  and  conclusions,  and 
when  it  endeavors  to  define  the  relations  of  political  eco- 
nomy to  morality  and  to  law,  it  is  less  original  and  less  new 
than  some  of  its  more  enthusiastic  followers  are  willing  to 
admit.  Referring  only  to  contemporary  economists,  who  are 
occupied  with  this  subject,  it  will  suffice  to  mention  the 
writings  of  Dameth,  Rondelet,  and  Boudrillart,  and  the  well- 
known  though  badly  translated  ( into  French )  work  of  M. 
Minghetti,  now  President  of  the  Council  in  Italy.  It  seems 
to  me,  however,  that  such  writers  as  Cliffe  Leslie,  Luzzati, 
Frederiksen,  Schmoller,  Held,  Wagner,  Contzen,  and  Nasse, 
are  better  equipped  than  the  school  of  Bastiat,  in  a  con- 
test with  the  existing  scientific  socialism,  which  supports 
itself  in  precisely  the  same  way,  on  abstract  formulas  and 
natural  economic  laws,  in  its  assaults  on  social  order  and  in 
its  demand  for  a  radical  reconstruction  of  society.  Bastiat 
imperilled  his  defence  at  the  very  outset,  by  placing  himself 


24  NEW    TENDENCIES    OF    POLITICAL    ECONOMY. 

too  exclusively  on  the  ground  of  theory,  for  he  was  thus 
compelled  to  contradict  facts  and  to  deny  doctrines  which 
are  admitted  by  all  economists,  as,  for  example,  the  classic 
theory  of  rent. 

The  realistic  economists,  on  the  contrary,  lay  hold  on  prin- 
ciples and  fortify  themselves  by  facts,  in  order  that  they 
may  follow  up  Utopian  theories  step  by  step,  being  careful 
to  distinguish  possible  reforms  from  those  which  are  not  pos- 
sible, and  the  rights  of  the  human  race  from  the  exactions 
of  covetousness  and  envy.  Such  is  the  mission  of  safety 
which  to-day,  more  than  ever  before,  is  imposed  on  political 
economy  in  presence  of  the  new  aspects  and  rapid  develop- 
ment which  socialism,  especially  in  Germany,  has  recently 
assumed. 


APPENDIX. 

On  the  evening  of  the  3ist  of  May,  1876,  the  Political 
Economy  Club  of  London  celebrated  the  icoth  anniversary 
of  the  publication  of  Adam  Smith's  Wealth  of  Nations.  Mr. 
Gladstone  presided  on  the  occasion,  and  speeches  were  made 
by  Mr.  Lowe,  M.  Leon  Say,  the  French  Minister  of  Finance, 
M.  fimile  de  Laveleye,  of  Belgium,  Professor  J.  E.  Thorold 
Rogers,  Mr.  Newmarch,  Mr.  Gladstone,  Mr.  Forster,  and  Mr. 
Leonard  Courtney.  Professor  de  Laveleye  addressed  the 
meeting  in  French.  The  following  is  a  translation  of  his 
remarks,  as  reported  by  the  London  Times,  in  its  issue  of 
June  5,  1876  : 

"I  should  hardly  venture  to  address  so  distinguished  an 
assembly,  in  presence  of  the  illustrious  statesman  who  is 
presiding  over  it,  and  of  another  statesman  who  worthily 
bears  the  name  of  the  great  French  economist,  Jean-Baptiste 
Say  (who  might  with  propriety  be  called  the  Adam  Smith  of 
the  Continent ),  did  I  not  desire,  in  the  name  of  my  country — 
Belgium — to  do  honor  to  the  eminent  Scottish  economist, 
whose  doctrines  of  free  trade  have  been  adopted  by  my 
countrymen,  to  the  great  benefit  of  the  Belgian  people.  In 
no  other  country,  not  even,  I  believe,  in  England,  have  those 
benefits  been  more  highly  appreciated  ;  for  the  Chambers  of 
Commerce  of  Belgium  have  come  to  demand  not  only  the 
abandonment  of  every  species  of  protection,  but  the  complete 
abolition  of  customs  duties. 

"  The  reason  why  we  ought  to  consider  Adam  Smith  as  one 
of  the  great  benefactors  of  the  human  race,  is  not  merely 
because  he  studied  into  the  '  causes  of  the  wealth  of  nations,' 
and  pointed  out  the  methods  of  increasing  production,  but 
because  he  demonstrated  that  the  interests  of  nations  are 
closely  bound  together,  and  has  thus  given  us  a  rational 
basis  of  human  brotherhood,  the  sublime  conception  of  which 
Christianity  first  introduced  into  the  world. 

"  In  the  last  century,  the  most  enlightened  men,  such  for 
example  as  Voltaire,  were  of  opinion  that  the  greatness  of 
one's  own  country  could  not  be  promoted  without  at  the 
same  time  desiring  to  enfeeble  other  nations,  and  this  per- 
nicious error  is  still  unfortunately  widely  prevalent. 

"Economists,  on  the  contrary,  have  proved  that  each  State 
is  interested  that  every  other  State  should  prosper,  in  order 
to  furnish  as  wide  a  market  as  possible  for  its  own  produc- 
tions, an  idea  happily  expressed  by  a  French  poet  in  these 
verses  : 


OF  THB 

'UNIVERSITY] 


26  APPENDIX. 

Aimer,   aimer  c'est  etre  utile  &  soi, 
Se  faire  aimer,   c'est  etre  utile  aux  autres. 

"  In  my  estimation,  the  first  part  of  the  programme  of  the 
political  economist,  that  which  concerns  the  production  of 
wealth,  may  be  considered  as  almost  exhausted.  When  we 
observe  the  prodigious  accumulation  of  wealth  which  is  to  be 
everywhere  met  with  in  England  ;  when  we  note  the  stupen- 
dous figures  of  its  foreign  commerce,  and  of  its  domestic 
exchanges;  the  130  or  140  milliards  of  francs  ($26,000,000,000 
to  $  28,000,000,000 )  covered  by  the  operation  of  its  Clearing 
House  ;  when  we  reflect  on  the  other  hand,  that  France  has 
been  able  to  pay  a  war  indemnity  of  five  or  six  milliards, 
besides  spending  at  least  three  or  four  milliards  more  in  a 
formidable  struggle,  and,  notwithstanding,  finds  itself  to-day 
as  prosperous  as  ever,  with  a  metallic  reserve  in  the  Bank  of 
France  of  two  milliards,  an  accumulation  of  the  precious 
metals  wholly  without  precedent,  we  are  led  to  believe  that, 
owing  to  the  marvelous  progress  of  the  sciences  and  arts, 
mankind  are  able,  at  the  present  day,  to  produce  all  that  is 
needful  to  satisfy  their  rational  wants.  What  is  now  needed 
is  to  enter  upon  the  second  part  of  the  economic  programme, 
that  which  concerns  /The  distribution  of  wealth^  The  object 
to  be  attained,  as  I  think  all  the  world  will  now  admit,  is 
to  ameliorate  the  condition  of  the  laboring  classes  in  such  a 
manner  that  each  person  may  enjoy  a  measure  of  well-being 
proportioned  to  the  part  which  he  has  taken  in  production, 
or,  to  sum  the  matter  up  in  a  single  word^to  realize  in  the 
economic  world  that  formula  of  justice  to  each  according  to  his 
works.") 

CT"  But  it  is  chiefly  upon  this  point  that  there  has  lately 
arisen  a  division  in  the  ranks  of  the  economists.  On  the  one 
hand,  the  elder  school,  which,  for  want  of  a  better  term,  T 
shall  denominate  the  orthodox  school,  holds  that  every  thing 
is  governed  by  natural  laws.  The  other  school,  which  its 
adversaries  have  styled  the  Socialists  of  the  Chair — Katheder- 
Socialisten — but  which  should  more  properly  be  called  the 
historical  school,  or,  as  the  Germans  say,  the  school  of  the 
realists,  maintains  that  distribution  is  regulated,  in  part,  no 
doubt,  by  free  contract,  but  still  more  by  civil  and  political 
institutions,  by  religious  beliefs,  by  moral  sentiments,  by  cus- 
toms, and  by  historical  traditions.  ^ 

"  You  will  observe  that  there  is  opened  here  an  immense 
field  of  study  which  comprehends  the  relations  of  political 
economy  with  morality,  with  the  idea  of  justice,  with  law, 
with  religion,  with  history,  and  which  allies  it  to  the  whole 
circle  of  the  social  sciences.  Such,  in  my  humble  opinion,  is 
the  present  mission  of  political  economy.  This  is  the  view  of 
it  which  has  been  held  by  nearly  all  the  German  economists, 
many  of  whom  have  attained  a  European  celebrit)'',  such  as 
Rau,  Roscher,  Knies,  Nasse,  Schafler,  and  Schmoller  ;  in  Italy 


APPENDIX.  27 

there  is  also  a  group  of  kindred  writers  already  well  known, 
such  as  Minghetti,  Luzzati,  and  Forti  ;  in  France,  there  are 
Wolowski,  Lavergne,  Passy,  Courcelle-Seneuil,  Leroy-Beaulieu  ; 
and  in  England  are  those  who  I  have  need  here  neither  to 
mention  nor  to  praise,  because  they  are  better  known  to  you 
than  to  me. 

17*  I  will  advert,  in  closing,  to  the  remarkable  fact  that  the 
two  schools  equally  invoke  the  authority  of  Adam  Smith,  and 
with  reason,  as  it  seems  to  me,  since  his  remarkable  work  is 
such  a  perfect  example,  and  one  so  fraught  with  useful  con- 
sequences, of  the  alliance  between  the  two  scientific  methods* 
the  deductive  method  and  the  inductive  method,  that  one  is, 
in  a  certain  sense,  almost  tempted  to  subscribe  to  the  recent 
assertion  of  an  American  economist,  that  after  Shakespeare, 
it  is  Adam  Smith  who  has  done  the  greatest  honor  to 

Ens""d"J 

'TJH17ERSIT7; 


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